


nepheligenous

by chateauofmyheart



Series: queen + rare words [6]
Category: Bohemian Rhapsody (Movie 2018), Queen (Band)
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Gen, Hopeful Ending, Hot Space Era, Smoking, brian hates smoking thats actually canon, brian-centric, brian? not nerding out about space?? wild, he's still a nerd tho, none of them are really happy rn, specifically 1981 while they were recording in munich
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-27
Updated: 2019-01-27
Packaged: 2019-10-17 11:57:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,727
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17559950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chateauofmyheart/pseuds/chateauofmyheart
Summary: nepheligenous - producing clouds of tobacco smoke"The studio was saturated with cigarette smoke again. Brian missed being able to breathe. "





	nepheligenous

The studio was hazy. Brian could barely see Roger behind the drumset, shielded by the cloud from his lungs. He wondered vaguely how Roger could see the drums in front of him, knowing his poor eyesight.

The smell was the same suffocating, lingering one from his childhood, sticky in the way it clung to his hair and their equipment. Everything smelled of cigarette smoke. The studio was full to the brim of it, so that when someone opened the door it poured onto the streets. 

It reminded him of his father, who carried smoke around him like a second jacket. Brian loved his father, but he’d always hated his hugs. The smoke would seep into his clothing and younger, stupider Brian had imagined that it kept going, right to his bones.

 

Smoke pooled in the corners of the sound booth, trapped by the glass. The people inside were spectres among the toxic fog. It looked ominous, like he was being watched by some evil presence, but he shook off the irrational (stupid) idea. His life was not a movie or a fairytale. He knew it because stories didn’t have two a.m. insomnia or the disjointed conversations of what had one point been a family feeling themselves drifting apart or empty moments of standing around in between takes, listening to John and Freddie discuss an album he was barely a part of.

Stories had endings. And waiting against the far wall, gazing out into the haze, Brian couldn’t see one. He couldn’t see much of anything, really, and wondered vaguely if that was the point. Maybe Roger sat behind the drums and lost himself in the smoke from his lungs so he wouldn’t see the ugly bitterness that seeped from the walls. Maybe Fred filled the sound booth with fog to bury himself in it, to hide from the reality; which was that nothing was working anymore.

 

Someone nearby blew out a column of smoke. Brian held in a cough from years of practice and took a sip of water, as if it would clear out the poison already in his body. Maybe in the smoke haze they had lost sight of what they were doing. It burned his eyes, and by the end of every day they were watering.

He found himself isolated more often than not nowadays, not able to stand among those who inhaled chemicals like it wasn’t burning their lungs away. They were burning _his_ lungs away as well, and the selfishness of it made his chest ache.

Maybe, in that smoke haze, they had lost sight of him too.

 

* * *

 

Munich was a beautiful city. Brian could see why Freddie liked it. (As his eyes followed the grand, column-filled architecture, he reminded himself that wasn’t really why Freddie liked it.) 

The city was nothing like London, he noted. Excluding the strange distance between the buildings that gave it almost a sense of vulnerability, it had a different feeling to it. The air was a different flavor, the stones were from a different ground, the blood running through the streets was a different red.

Even the birds were different, he thought, as he watched some pigeons hop up to a nearby man with a pretzel, who scowled and ignored them. Brian pitied the birds, but knew that bread wasn’t actually healthy for them. They, in turn, ignored him as he walked past, perhaps smelling his empty pockets.

 

He held his breath as he stepped by a lit cigarette poking out of a dirty alcove. The studio was far behind him now, the others still presumably still breathing chemicals and discontent. No one had noticed him slip out. It was what he wanted, and yet-

It stung, a little. He missed when they actually spoke together, when Freddie was only an hour late instead of three and John hadn’t yet built himself a minibar inside an amp, as if drinking was the only way he could stand to do shows.

That smoke had gone to all of their brains, he supposed ruefully.

 

Brian wandered through the city, sunglasses on as if it would keep him from being recognized. There was a sensation of separation between him and his surroundings; maybe it was the unfamiliar words or the different clothing, but it was unlike the isolation of the studio because out here he could get lost in it. Here, he wasn’t pressed against the walls and reminded he didn’t fit anymore. He could get lost in the alien streets. He could breathe.

He ended up at a small bakery with a name he could translate if he bothered to think about it long enough. The woman behind the counter was kind to his fumbled German, offered him words when he gave up and pointed. 

Her smile was kind and motherly and all at once Brian missed home, missed it so desperately he nearly cried in that little shop, wearing an obnoxiously low-buttoned shirt and clutching a paper bag of some sweet rolls.

 

He ate those rolls alone on a park bench, under the shade of some trees. The air was clear, and not-quite-clean but so much better than the Musicland studio. The leaves above him were green- not brilliantly, they actually looked rather dull, being trapped in the city- and it brought him a comfort that only his garden back in England could. 

He missed home. He missed Queen. And then wondered when he’d started separating the two.

 

* * *

 

The studio was saturated with cigarette smoke again. Brian missed being able to breathe. 

He found himself frustrated, which was more alive than he’d been in a while, trapped in hollow resignation, but also made that _hurt_ , the loud and angry pain he’d filled himself with over the past year, claw at the insides of his ribs. Like it would burst out with sharp teeth and nails and rip every ugly thing about this place to shreds, were it not caged by the bones of Brian’s chest. 

He let it fume in his heart until it felt like he was breathing smoke with the rest of them, except this was pure fire, free of those disgusting, sticky chemicals. That morning, he was made of hurt; bones like heated glass, brittle and impossibly strong. 

 

He pulled the Red Special over his shoulder, feeling her body resting against his shoulder blades, and left, ignoring the smoke that pooled onto the street below the doorstep.

He walked and walked until his legs ached and his feet screamed for a rest. He wished offhandedly to be one of the many pigeons hopping and fluttering around him, then crumpled that thought like scrap paper and tossed it. A few people eyed the guitar on his back, but no one approached him, swarmed by pigeons as he was.

 

There was a huddle of girls to his left that looked suspiciously like fans, if their tracking eyes were anything to go by. Brian’s gut twisted; he appreciated their appreciation but he didn’t want them to approach him, not at all. He still had molten glass bones and smoke lingered in his hair, foul smelling and unhappy. 

He ducked into the nearest shop with panic in his throat. It was a clothing boutique, selling vintage and second-hand outfits that, upon sight, sent him back to the early days of Queen, the extravagant stage numbers and the heavy jewelry and the fine details that had been lost somewhere on the way. His mind conjured up an image of Freddie and Roger in their little market stall, wearing long hair and ridiculous old jackets and brilliant, carefree smiles. Brian shook it away, eyes stinging.

Glancing back to see the girls still watching through the window, he went deeper into the store. Nostalgia washed over him, pooling bittersweet and warm in his gut. He toyed with some dark wooden beads identical to ones he still owned and used to wear, before Freddie had made a comment about it not matching their look and Brian buried them somewhere in a jewelry box like they were something to regret.

He found himself absorbed, brushing his fingers along scarves and jackets, flicking through low cut embroidered shirts, running his hands through a box of rings. Brian hadn’t even realized he’d been touching everything until his eyes met a girl’s across the shelf who was watching him, amused. He dropped his hands in embarrassment and ducked his head.

He probably looked like a creep, he realized.

“You are Brian May.”

It wasn’t a question. Brian back looked up at the girl. She tilted her head and the corner of her mouth twitched.

“You are very easy to recognize,” she told him in her German-accented English. Her hand waved towards her hair. “The hair. The guitar.”

Brian breathed out a laugh, tugging at the hair in question self-consciously. “Yeah, that’s me” he offered lamely.

“Would you like to buy?” She sounded hopeful. He realized it would probably mean a great deal to her if he purchased something. He looked down to the ring box he’d been fingering through.

A thin, simple, metal grey band caught his eye. He hoped it wouldn’t offend Freddie’s new _look_ , then reminded himself he didn’t need Freddie’s approval for how to dress. He was a grown man. Freddie didn’t always know best. 

Clearly.

“I’ll take this.” He held up the ring for her inspection, then edged around the shelf so he was at the counter next to her. She took it carefully and slipped around behind the register. 

 

Ring on his right pointer finger, he signed her t-shirt with the pen she’d given him. It was a snug fit and didn’t impede his hand movement at all, to his great satisfaction. The girl- who’d mentioned her name, “Marie” with a little grin, when handing him the ring back- thanked him brightly, tracing his name along her shoulder.

An “oh!” stopped Brian before he could walk out. Turning back, he came to face with a large elastic hair band covered in scrunched up white fabric. He blinked.

“It will not be as easy to be recognized” Marie explained, and then it clicked. He took the proffered hair band with a laugh and a thanks, pulling it onto his wrist before reaching up to his hair. He’d never really put his hair up, but he assumed it wasn’t that hard. Gathering the long strands around his neck, he wrapped the band around the fistful and then doubled it over. 

Marie pulled a thoughtful face. He pulled out the ponytail.

“Do you want to do it?” He gave it to her, watching her face light up.

“Yes, please!” was the eager reply. He turned around and crouched, giving her better access. At the first touch of her small hands to his head, Brian heard a sharp gasp and a quiet mutter in German.

She delicately raked her fingers through his hair, tugging back the curls framing his face. He found himself relaxing into it almost embarrassingly quickly. It’d been too long since someone had touched him gently. The healing bruises on his ribs gave a slight throb.

“Okay. Done.”

He stood up, hands flying up instinctively to feel what she’d done. All the hair long enough to fit had gone back into the ponytail, leaving the shorter curls to hang over his forehead and around his ears.

He wondered what he looked like. Marie beamed up at him proudly.

“You look different! Still beautiful, but different. And your hair is very nice. Soft.”

Brian’s ears burned with the compliment and something light fluttered in his chest. ( _Beautiful?_ )

“Thank you, you’re very kind.”

She waved cheerfully goodbye as he slipped his sunglasses back on and stepped out.

 

* * *

 

The park was the same when he found it again. The green, choked leaves rustled atop the trees and Brian settled underneath one, pulling the Red Special into his lap as he leaned against the rough bark.

Mindlessly, he strummed, making little tuning adjustments and experimenting with different noises. She still had so much potential he hadn’t discovered yet. Without any amp, there wasn’t as much that he could do, but he had a sixpence and time and that was enough.

Brian briefly considered the carbon cycle, all the trees and the service they did to the planet, refreshing the air humans breathed. All part of the circle of nature. Humans breathed in oxygen, exhaled carbon dioxide. Trees breathed in carbon dioxide, exhaled oxygen. On and so forth, a perfect balancing act. And now humans were cutting strings of the tightrope, pumping carbon and chemicals out of their machines and their lungs.

It was disgusting, and terrifying. The planet could only support their parasitic existence for so long. And no one cared. They just unhinged their jaws and breathed out more smoke.

He should get the studio a plant, he decided.

 

Brian found himself plucking out of Love of My Life. He listened, strangely detached, as the melody became somehow more mournful, slowing the speed until it would’ve been impossible to sing along to.

“Brian?”

He looked up to the familiar voice to see John standing at the edge of the grass, staring at him. In his confusion, John seemed to have forgotten he didn’t like Brian anymore. Brian decided he would take it.

He reached up and remembered his hair. Oh. That’s why John sounded surprised.

Brian folded his legs as he approached. John stood over him, looking unsure as to whether he should sit down or not. Brian didn’t help him choose.. John remained standing.

“You left early.” Maybe John hadn’t meant to sound accusing. Brian shrugged.

“Wanted some fresh air.” He stared at him, face unreadable. Brian couldn’t hold his gaze and looked down to his guitar. An uncomfortable blank space where conversation may have once been stretched between them. There was no smoke, and yet Brian still felt like he was suffocating. Neither of them said anything else.

John eventually walked off. He never asked about Brian’s hair. 

 

* * *

 

Brian went to the studio the next day, because despite it all, he still did his job. 

John and Roger smoked while waiting for Freddie and Brian leaned against the far wall, trying not to inhale the barrier they created. The Red Special sat beside him, proud and tall and Brian knew he wasn’t going to be playing her today.

He didn’t know if everyone noticed he’d left, or just John, the ever-observant one. He didn’t ask. John didn’t acknowledge yesterday’s conversation and Brian wasn’t really sure how to feel about it, caught between hollow relief and familiar disappointment. It felt like there wasn’t space for either, in the haze-filled studio; toxic chemicals filling the gaps where emotions should’ve been.

When Freddie finally arrived, the haze thickened and Brian could’ve choked on it except he gave up breathing somewhere in between walking out of the park and walking in to the studio. He left his lungs, full as they were with second-hand hurt, nestled between the stones in the German streets. Maybe some pigeons could make a meal of them.

(Except he hadn’t; they were still there, aching in his chest and longing for his garden at home, where the leaves were vibrant, brilliant green and breathing easily and so was he. But the haze had numbed him and he could pretend.)

Knowing- or maybe just hoping- no one would see through the smoke clouds, Brian left. He threw the door wide open and let the smoke wave crash behind him, dissipating as he walked away. Pressing his sunglasses to his nose, he pulled the white hair band off his wrist and tugged his hair back.

 

(He brought in a plant the next day, a small potted tree. One of the techs helped him haul it to the corner of the far wall, silent except for a light comment about ‘brightening up the place’ and Brian smiled at him, grateful in a way he couldn’t describe.

No one else said a word about it, or about the flash of an extra ring on Brian’s hand, and despite the cigarette haze Brian stood next to his tree and found he could breathe. It was still hard to see, and maybe they would get lost in the haze and stumble away from each other, but Brian could _breathe_.

For now, that would have to be enough.)

**Author's Note:**

> time for some shameless self-promotion! if you liked this fic, you'll (probably) like _like a breakup except there's nothing to break_ an angsty hot space fic featuring brian and his questionable mental health
> 
> moving on: i finally got myself a tumblr. chateauofmymind.tumblr.com - i don't do much except ramble occasionally and i don't really know how anything works but hmu if you have questions or want to talk :)


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